Strategy Are we seeing a general change of tack towards proven players over picks ?

[Richo83]

How do you figure? The All Australian team is full of late picks that are stars. Neale, Kelly, Stewart, Harris Andrews, Walters, Charlie Cameron, Jeremy McGovern and Elliot Yeo were all pretty late. Fyfe was pick 20 too.

Draft years of the aforementioned players:

Neale 2011
Walters 2008
Andrews 2014
Cameron 2013
McGovern 2011
Yeo 2011
Fyfe 2009

Way to prove my point, the only example you can think of SINCE 2013 WHICH IS THE YEAR I STIPULATED is Cameron and Andrews. Cameron is is a good small forward, but finished sixth in the lion's best and fairest. If he's not even in the top five of the lions, then I doubt he's elite. His finals record is patchy over the past two years, and has had three bad finals alongside two good ones. The elite players playing in elite positions, i.e. midfield and forward are the players who win games, not KPDs and small forwards. I didn't feel like I had to stipulate this, but I did.

As for Andrews, I'm sorry but he's not elite. To be an elite backman you need to rebound and defend. Andrews does the latter, doesn't do much of the former. He's a poor man's Rance and even he's shown to be not that crucial given Richmond took about half a season to figure out how to play without him. I equate Andrews to Grimes, who does his role well, but isn't among the elite players of the competition.

I actually don't think there are that many elite backmen in the league in general. I think it's pretty easy to be a backman in the modern era, given the modern tactics, and I don't think it's surprising that clubs generally don't spend high draft picks on KPDs, Carlton excluded. It's a negating reactive role which doesn't require that much creativity or natural skill as opposed to being a midfielder or forward. Forwards are underrated in the low scoring era as we look at them and presume that they mustn't be that good as they're not kicking that many goals. No, it's just that we live in an era of negative tactics, not superstar defenders.

 

[DanA]

Draft years of the aforementioned players:

Neale 2011
Walters 2008
Cameron 2013
McGovern 2011
Yeo 2011
Fyfe 2009

Way to prove my point, the only example you can think of SINCE 2013 WHICH IS THE YEAR I STIPULATED is Cameron who is a good small forward, but finished sixth in the lion's best and fairest. If he's not even in the top five of the lions, then I doubt he's elite.

Kelly and Stewart? Harris Andrews was 2014 also.

All that shows is it takes 5+ years to become elite.

 

[my name was taken]

Timing thing imo,

The top teams are trying to hold on, and bottom teams been there too long to wait for more picks to develop.

 

[Richo83]

Kelly and Stewart? Harris Andrews was 2014 also.

Stewart isn't elite, he's a medium defender who defends well for in team which plays on narrow grounds using a defensive gameplan. In the finals, once Geelong were forced to defend larger areas of space and play attacking teams, their defense was exposed. He also gets fed the ball a lot which inflates his stats. Most of the important work is done by the midfield which shields the backline by putting pressure forward of the backline. He's good, but teams are shying away from drafting back flankers in the top ten for good reason.

Kelly has already missed half of his career so is discounted. Most players aren't mature aged picks like Kelly.

 

[DanA]

Stewart isn't elite, he's a medium defender who defends well for in team which plays on narrow grounds using a defensive gameplan. In the finals, once Geelong were forced to defend larger areas of space and play attacking teams, their defense was exposed. He also gets fed the ball a lot which inflates his stats. Most of the important work is done by the midfield which shields the backline by putting pressure forward of the backline. He's good, but teams are shying away from drafting back flankers in the top ten for good reason.

Kelly has already missed half of his career so is discounted. Most players aren't mature aged picks like Kelly.

This is like the twilight zone.

Everything you say is wrong. We could see two HBF players go top 5 this year and while you can say Kelly is discounted. His trade price certainly wasn’t.

Complete rubbish about Stewart too.

 

[Richo83]

This is like the twilight zone.

Everything you say is wrong. We could see two HBF players go top 5 this year and while you can say Kelly is discounted. His trade price certainly wasn’t.

Complete rubbish about Stewart too.

I'm not interested in maybes or coulds. Teams often draft HBFs to turn them into midfielders.

We're seeing a general trend towards full-time midfielders and KPFs picked early on in the drafts. As for Kelly, teams are somewhat hesitant to pick mature agers, and, yes, his price was discounted due to his age. Sure, teams are paying big now, but that doesn't change the fact that his price was discounted due to age. Most gun teenagers go in the first 10-15 these days. And again, most draftees are teenagers, so Kelly is an anomaly.

As for Stewart, yeah, he's elite. So elite that he often plays on the third or fourth best forward or plays loose in the backline being fed the ball. I think he's a good player but I don't consider a player who plays his role to be an elite player of the competition. He's not a player who you can build a side around, and needs midfielders to prepare up forward and key defenders to hold the main forwards. Plays on players like Townsend and McStay. He's one of the best at what he does, but what he does isn't as hard as more crucial roles like midfield and KPFs.

 

[Richo83]

Just to prove my point, Houli made All-Australian and is arguably one of the best HBFs in the league. Yet IMO he's behind Martin, Riewoldt, Prestia, Edwards, Lynch, Rance and Lambert in terms of importance to the team. So he's one of the best HBFs, yet he's ninth in terms of importance in a premiership side, and was drafted using the PSD.

 

[Pessimistic]

Consider before 2010 there was an all time low in players moving clubs, there has been an increase.

Perhaps the compromised expansion drafts encouraged clubs to get inventive and they havent gone back to the preceding orthodoxy*

You can also see the total number of players drafted each year has not gone up much from pre 2010, even though the league is 12% bigger. I imagine players stay on lists longer.


But on the ‘Orthodoxy’ which some people still agree with
‘List cloggers’ ‘but will he be there for your next premiership’ etc etc.

It said that because theres a national draft, favouring the lower teams, your club takes a cycle, and while its down, it take as as many draftees as possible, even trading out assets in thir prime, aiming at a supposed time in the near future where all these kids develop together, then you ‘top up’ for needs and bingo, flag.
The other thing mentioned is limited lists meant a team couldnt maintain age profile in every type of player needed, which is true to a point
The priority pick era eccentuated this orthodoxy, and some very spectacular successes from teams who appeard to use this strategy well.

Before this ‘draft era orthodoxy’ the prevailing view was not that at all.

Id like to pose that the teams appearing to benefit from this strategy did so because they happened to need players arounf that 2001 draft, which was a bumper one. Teams which had five or more draftees, they were set up for a decade or more. St kilda geelong hawthorn. Carlton were excluded due to afl punishment, and despite lots of early draft picke priority picks since, ahave not done well
The average age also goes in cycles, but when you have a low average age, you wont be winning anything that year

My argument is if you go the cyclical strategy, and it coincides with good years, its ok. Otherwise, not so much and you may be locked into mining a poor quality vein for a long time, and the clubs internal cultural strength suffers

Now if you commit to taking each year on its merits, take mature trading opportunities as well as drafting each year rather than to some cycle, you keep your average age higher and are in the mix every year
You probably wont go down the ladder, so need to forget the first 10 or so picks, and then realise after that, pick 35 could be as productive as pick 15


In fact in 2001 hawks werent at the bottom of the ladder, but traded into 2001, which kind of goes against what I am saying. But i still maintain it right strategy, right time.

 

[DanA]

Free Agency was introduced in 2012. I’d suggest that is a big reason behind player movements.

 

[TigerKnights]

Drafting by all clubs is getting better. And not just at the national draft, a bevy of rookies and pre season picks have famously been great (is it too early to mention mid season draft.... yes, yes it is) so it is becoming more of a talent match to your clubs style/structure (footy tripe for how your team plays). And then backing in the plethora of coaches to mould what the player CAN do (not what they carn't) into an advantage for the system (cough team) Id say Hawks pioneered it on a mass level though, all clubs have got it right on an individual basis over the years and are getting better, the tiges have refined it, where (Lynch being the exception) looked to fringe players who could simply compliment the picks they had. There is not a single soul here that would have thought from where the came from Houli/Castagna/Broad/Grimes/Nanks/Short/Baker/Soldos would be apart of flag team let alone making up a significant portion. Clubs are looking to emulate both operations.

 

[blitzer]

We have seen a movement more towards proven players over picks however there will never come a time when high draft picks are not prized. Maybe in certain years but if you saw how the top picks from the 2018 draft went last year - well draft picks can be immensely valuable.

If there is one thing that is significantly hurting the value of draft picks - its not the realisation of proven players being valuable compared to draft picks - its the rise of the academies. There was always F/S but academies are churning out way more picks and all of a sudden there is one or two players in the top 10 each draft that are unavailable to all bar one or two clubs.

There is still no better outcome to improve a team's long term outlook than hitting a superstar with a draft pick. Even more so if you can get someone from your home state who never wants to leave your club. Probably the most valuable pickups that I can recall to individual teams in recent memory would be:
Pendlebury and Dustin Martin. Rarely miss games, were quality right from the start of their careers and have played fantastic AA level footy for many years.
Is there a single player in the comp you would rather have than picking up an 18 year old Pendlebury or Martin? Of course it goes without saying there will always be a risk - reward element to drafting and that's why its so interesting.

We have yet to see the evidence that Hawks strategy will actually work without a strong core of elite players centered around some high draft picks. I don't think its impossible but I'd be betting that more teams win premierships with a number of good high draft picks backed up by value acquisitions and some trades added later in the more standard mould.

 

[FISTO]

The draft is too heavily compromised

 

[Pessimistic]

We have seen a movement more towards proven players over picks however there will never come a time when high draft picks are not prized. Maybe in certain years but if you saw how the top picks from the 2018 draft went last year - well draft picks can be immensely valuable.

If there is one thing that is significantly hurting the value of draft picks - its not the realisation of proven players being valuable compared to draft picks - its the rise of the academies. There was always F/S but academies are churning out way more picks and all of a sudden there is one or two players in the top 10 each draft that are unavailable to all bar one or two clubs.

There is still no better outcome to improve a team's long term outlook than hitting a superstar with a draft pick. Even more so if you can get someone from your home state who never wants to leave your club. Probably the most valuable pickups that I can recall to individual teams in recent memory would be:
Pendlebury and Dustin Martin. Rarely miss games, were quality right from the start of their careers and have played fantastic AA level footy for many years.
Is there a single player in the comp you would rather have than picking up an 18 year old Pendlebury or Martin? Of course it goes without saying there will always be a risk - reward element to drafting and that's why its so interesting.

We have yet to see the evidence that Hawks strategy will actually work without a strong core of elite players centered around some high draft picks. I don't think its impossible but I'd be betting that more teams win premierships with a number of good high draft picks backed up by value acquisitions and some trades added later in the more standard mould.

Done to death in another thread but the hawks (and cats, swans) have been successful and have not had access to the high draft picks

 

[Danger2Jenkins]

Increase the draft age to 21 and gauge a large pool of players over 3 full seasons. Stop developing/playing spuds in the professional comp. TAC cup whilst still in high school doesn't mean much. Yet Boyd and basically GWS entire list have been paid millions due to their tac cup performances.

 

[HairyO]

Clarko has never valued picks over players. He values players - whether in the draft or poachable from other teams.

 

[blitzer]

Done to death in another thread but the hawks (and cats, swans) have been successful and have not had access to the high draft picks

Oh yeah I barely even noticed that Hodge, Lewis, Roughead, Franklin and Rioli were out there during the Hawks flags. That's just off the top of my head I'm sure I missed someone else too. Hawks were a typical build, not something overly special. If you were to win a premiership in 2020 that would be another story.

 

[HairyO]

Oh yeah I barely even noticed that Hodge, Lewis, Roughead, Franklin and Rioli were out there during the Hawks flags. That's just off the top of my head I'm sure I missed someone else too. Hawks were a typical build, not something overly special. If you were to win a premiership in 2020 that would be another story.

Plenty of other clubs have had just as many or more top draft picks yet not come close to the level of success.

 

[DanA]

The system we have is unfair for non-destination clubs and needs to change. To me the best way to do that would be as follows:
- 4-year rookie contracts with a 5th-year option for 1st round picks.
- If a player goes through the draft, they are then an undrafted free agent
- Players can be delisted and free agents picked up until week 13
- Free agency after rookie contract
- All compo picks are graded as either end of 1st, 2nd or 3rd round. (no midround picks)

 

[Pessimistic]

Oh yeah I barely even noticed that Hodge, Lewis, Roughead, Franklin and Rioli were out there during the Hawks flags. That's just off the top of my head I'm sure I missed someone else too. Hawks were a typical build, not something overly special. If you were to win a premiership in 2020 that would be another story.

Loaded up 2001 and again in 2004. Best time to do it. My point is plenty of clubs have tried it in lean draft years and got nowhere
Clubs who set up in 2001 are still reaping the benefit, even though only two players remain. and you dont see those clubs rushing for the so called hard rebuild.
Clubs who have been successful dont see the need to return to the ‘hard rebuild’ orthodoxy. Luckily for them some clubs still do. We see st kilda believing from its age demographic its time to top up for a flag tilt. Yet they handed McEvoy over to hawthorn, who is still going strong, and topped up this year with ryder, whos motivation seems suspect to say the least

Truly the best path id to go somewhere in between, and assess each individual case, not some arbitary number.
In the case of the hawks, players coming into the best 22 have come 50:50 from trades and the draft since 2009
The success this is made up of some 86% of trade ins making best 22, and 40% plus of draftees making best 22. Quite good return as the average draft pick used is #48

 

[Pessimistic]

Oh yeah I barely even noticed that Hodge, Lewis, Roughead, Franklin and Rioli were out there during the Hawks flags. That's just off the top of my head I'm sure I missed someone else too. Hawks were a typical build, not something overly special. If you were to win a premiership in 2020 that would be another story.

My point is the just didnt have the early draft picks where superstars usually go. They have had to be more inventive.

Theres very few cases where a pick under 10 has been deliberately traded from these clubs

In 2009 hawks finished 9th with just 9 wins. Missed out on finals and early draft picks. No one was saying the hawks had a great core then, in fact they were looking a bit dodgy due to wasted early picks muston thorpe dowler etc

Traded in burgoyne gibson hale gunston lake mcevoy frawley and drafted smith shiels stratton bruest suckling puopolo.
Without those would have been lucky to get one flag, but actually got three

 

[Marcel Proust]

Being able to cover Rance was the most impressive one imo. I knew Grimes and Vlaustin were good I just didn't realize that they were that good

With the mentioned players especially Martin, Reiwoldt & Lynch is they are game breakers, there aren't many of them in the league let alone having 3 in the one team

Grimes and Vlastuin are really good. Astbury is no mug either.

I kind of agree with your point but with out the players I mentioned (Martin, Cotchin, Reiwoldt, Rance, Prestia & Lynch) you wouldn't be a top 8 team

on the other hand
- Rance didnt play this season and richmond won the flag / finshed top 4.
- Cotchin & Riewoldt had signifacnt injury issues and missed a boat load.
- Lynch wasnt fit until about mid season
- Martin looked a bit off early on
- Prestia finally got a preseason for the first time in about 5 years iiirc

 

[Art Corvelay]

Just to prove my point, Houli made All-Australian and is arguably one of the best HBFs in the league. Yet IMO he's behind Martin, Riewoldt, Prestia, Edwards, Lynch, Rance and Lambert in terms of importance to the team. So he's one of the best HBFs, yet he's ninth in terms of importance in a premiership side, and was drafted using the PSD.

Is he?

Arguably should be 2x Norm Smith over Dusty.
Generates all the run and carry from defence

Why teams don’t put a man on him I don’t understand.

 

[Marcel Proust]

Is he?

Arguably should be 2x Norm Smith over Dusty.
Generates all the run and carry from defence

Why teams don’t put a man on him I don’t understand.

Houli is a legend but he is probable behind Lynch, Riewoldt, Martin, Cotchin, Prestia, Lambert, Rance, Grimes, Vlastuin, Astbury, Edwards and maybe more in terms of importance to the team,

Houli not being in the 'most important' 10 mind sound far fetched but it isnt.

the Giants tried to tag Martin/Prestia and Lambert. There are only so many players you can tag at once.

 

[Richo83]

Is he?

Yes.

Arguably should be 2x Norm Smith over Dusty.
Generates all the run and carry from defence

I sincerely disagree. Martin was BOG in both grand finals.

Why teams don’t put a man on him I don’t understand.

Because teams focus more on other tigers players instead. This is also because Houli's opponent, which is usually a HFF is trying to generate their own attack themselves.

 

[sydney_gws]

How do you figure? The All Australian team is full of late picks that are stars. Neale, Kelly, Stewart, Harris Andrews, Walters, Charlie Cameron, Jeremy McGovern and Elliot Yeo were all pretty late. Fyfe was pick 20 too.

I think it is due to free agency. If you trade in a player, they help the look of your list and help attract free agents. Players are analysing which is the best list for future success in order to decide which club to go to (as treloar said, also a key reason why Josh kelly did not want to go to north melbourne).